No software needed automatic monitor input switcher. This would mostly be useful for autoswitching between Amiga native graphics output and a Video card such as Radeon. Might be interesting to also convert Amiga's video signal to standard VGA (Scandoubler + Flickerfixer capability) as well as to digital DVI.
The no software needed bit would look for clocks on secondary video inputs, if none found then switch to the Amiga input. If a clock is found then switch to that connection. OK, this depends on the video card driver turning off the hsync/vsync when not active, so hopefully no additional software needed. I'm nto sure how this would affect a DVI digital input as I don't know DVI signalling at this point. If it doesn't have an hsync/vsync sort of thing in there somewhere then I'll need to do some DVI stream decoding.
I originally envisioned this as a switch between a Radeon or other VGA card and flickerfixed Amiga output. Time moved on, and now DVI is perhaps more important than VGA, so converting from Amiga to DVI and perhaps other VGA to DVI is an interesting feature as well. And perhaps include in that flickerfixer as well if needed. Converting VGA (and thus already flickerfixed Amiga) to DVI is likely simple, there's surely chips to do that already.
I'm not sure how to go about making a flickerfixer, I suppose read the color signals into an A/D converter or perhaps use the digital video signals in the Amiga video slot or graphics chip socket directly if possible. Buffer each frame into a dual port memory, with the second port being read and output at VGA and/or DVI rates, dumping VGA color signals into a D/A converter.
Automatic Monitor input switch
No software needed automatic monitor input switcher. This would mostly be useful for autoswitching between Amiga native graphics output and a Video card such as Radeon. Might be interesting to also convert Amiga's video signal to standard VGA (Scandoubler + Flickerfixer capability) as well as to digital DVI.
The no software needed bit would look for clocks on secondary video inputs, if none found then switch to the Amiga input. If a clock is found then switch to that connection. OK, this depends on the video card driver turning off the hsync/vsync when not active, so hopefully no additional software needed. I'm nto sure how this would affect a DVI digital input as I don't know DVI signalling at this point. If it doesn't have an hsync/vsync sort of thing in there somewhere then I'll need to do some DVI stream decoding.
I originally envisioned this as a switch between a Radeon or other VGA card and flickerfixed Amiga output. Time moved on, and now DVI is perhaps more important than VGA, so converting from Amiga to DVI and perhaps other VGA to DVI is an interesting feature as well. And perhaps include in that flickerfixer as well if needed. Converting VGA (and thus already flickerfixed Amiga) to DVI is likely simple, there's surely chips to do that already.
I'm not sure how to go about making a flickerfixer, I suppose read the color signals into an A/D converter or perhaps use the digital video signals in the Amiga video slot or graphics chip socket directly if possible. Buffer each frame into a dual port memory, with the second port being read and output at VGA and/or DVI rates, dumping VGA color signals into a D/A converter.
Sounds like a fun project for both PCB and FPGA.